Valorant Ranks: Ascendant, Immortal, Radiant Explained

Want to know more about Valorant Ranks? Just like all competitive FPS games, Valorant has a ranked system. Even so, understanding how each game's ranking system works can be a bit confusing and as there are some key differences between Valorant's ranking system compared to other games.

Here's everything you need to know about Valorant ranks, so you can enter ranked games armed with knowledge.

How to Play Valorant Ranked

Before you can start playing competitive ranked games, you first need to meet Riot's minimum requirements for Valorant ranked. Previously, the only requirement to be eligible for ranked was to have 20 unrated games played. However, the issue that this presented was the barrier to entering the ranked scene for smurfs was too low. As such, as of Episode 4, Act 1, the requirement for ranked is to have an account level of 20.

If you are not yet level 20 but your account was eligible for ranked prior to this change, you will still be eligible for ranked.

Valorant Ranks and Tiers

Valorant's ranked system for the most part is fairly straightforward. There are 9 different ranks that you can achieve, and within the first 8 ranks, there are 3 different tiers. In ascending order, these ranks are called:

• Iron
• Bronze
• Silver
• Gold
• Platinum
• Diamond
• Ascendant
• Immortal
• Radiant (Previously known as Valorant)

For ranks Iron through Immortal, there are 3 different sub-divisions you must go through. For example, to get from Gold to Platinum, you must go through Gold 1, Gold 2, and then Gold 3 before you can promote to Platinum 1. However, once you reach the highest rank in the game, Radiant, there are no more sub-divisions you have to go through.

For ranks Iron to Ascendant, each tier will require 100RR in order to promote to the next tier. Once you promote, regardless of how much RR you gained, you will be set at 10RR of the rank you were promoted to.

For Immortal, players will require 90RR to go from Immortal 1 to Immortal 2, and 200RR to go from Immortal 2 to Immortal 3 with no cap on the amount of RR they can accumulate.

For players that want to obtain the coveted Radiant rank, players must first achieve the minimum cut-off of 450RR in Immortal to promote. However, not every player that is above 450RR in Immortal will be promoted to Radiant. Only the top 500 players that are above the 450RR threshold will be Radiant.

Players that have achieved the ranks of Immortal or Radiant have their on the public leaderboard that all players can view through the ranked tab.

Getting Started with Ranked

In order to progress through the ranks, players must select the "Ranked" queue when playing the game. For new players, after playing 5 ranked games, they finish their placements are their rank is revealed. At the start of each act, ranks become hidden again and players must play 1 ranked game in order to reveal their rank. At the start of each episode however, ranks are "soft-reset" meaning that players will typically drop 1-2 full ranks in order to reset the ranked ladders for players to climb again.

After you have revealed your rank, any further ranked games that you play will contribute positively or negatively towards your rank and your RR (Rank Rating). Each win that you accumulate will give you RR, and each loss that you accumulate will subtract RR. However, alongside your visible RR, there is also MMR (Match Making Rating) which is also tied to your ranked experience.

Match Making Rating

Your MMR (Match Making Rating) is one of the most important values tied to your account. This is because although this value is hidden and will never be visible, this number is what determines who you will be matched against regardless of your RR (Rank Rating). This means that your rank can be a Gold, but if your MMR was that of Platinum players, you would be matched up against Platinum players during ranked. Furthermore, you'd most likely gain more RR and lose less RR if your rank is below your MMR.

Rank Rating

Your RR (Rank Rating) is the number of points that you have and will be affected after each Ranked Game. For accounts that are newer to the game, individual performance has more impact on the amount of RR that you will gain compared to the outcome of the game. This means that if you were to do exceptionally well and lose, you would lose a lot less than you may normally lose. However, as you play more, the emphasis on RR gained and lost is shifted toward the overall outcome of the game.

As mentioned before, to promote from one rank to another, with the exception of Immortal and Radiant, you will need 100RR in order to promote to the next tier. While the number of points gained during each game is different, the general point distribution will look something like this:

It is important to note, however, that if you were to lose while only having 0RR in your current tier, you will demote to the previous tier. Once you demote, you will have "demotion protection" and as a result you will be set to 80RR of the previous rank at the lowest, meaning that you will only need 20RR to get back to the rank you just demoted from. On the flipside, you will have that same "demotion protection" when you promote to a higher tier, and will be set to at least 10RR of your new rank. This means that you can still lose at least 1 game and remain in the rank you just promoted to.